United a challenge we must meet

The most moving words of President Barack Obama's State of the Union Address - and maybe the most important ones - came near the end last Tuesday night when he talked about Cory Remsburg.

Obama first met Remsburg, an Army Ranger, in 2009 at Omaha Beach in France as the president was marking the 65th anniversary of D-Day. Months later, Remsburg was on his 10th deployment when a roadside bomb in Afghanistan severely wounded him. He is blind in one eye, has undergone dozens of surgeries and stood Tuesday at the Capitol with the loving help of his father, Craig.

As he introduced Remsburg, Obama went on to say: "And he's working toward the day when he can serve his country again. 'My recovery has not been easy,' he says. 'Nothing in life that's worth anything is easy.'

"Cory is here tonight. And like the Army he loves, like the America he serves, Sergeant First Class Cory Remsburg never gives up, and he does not quit."

Democrats and Republicans alike - in the House Chamber and probably among TV viewers around the country - wiped away tears as Remsburg was accorded a lengthy standing ovation.

Yet there is a vast gulf between what men and women such as Sgt. 1st Class Remsburg have given this country ... and the America we give them. They have laid their lives on the line, knowing that their brothers and sisters beside them have their backs. Yet back home in America we can't even get along long enough to pass most of the major bills in Congress.

It is no wonder that so many veterans have difficulty assimilating to civilian life back home in America. They are used to collaboration, shared goals and mutual support, not civic backbiting.

If we truly supported Remsburg and his compatriots - and we should - we would force ourselves, and our political allies, to rise to the challenge and find something better in ourselves. We would not bury our disagreements, but we would resolve them. We would put our commonalities and our mutual goals ahead of self-serving political gains.

Most Americans want the same things, whether those Americans are Barack Obama or Salem, Ore., native Cathy McMorris Rodgers, who gave the Republican response Tuesday night as a congresswoman from Eastern Washington. Where we differ is in the means to those goals; we have allowed those differences to define how we treat one another in politics.

Both Obama and Rodgers took small steps Tuesday evening, delivering speeches that staked out their political positions without descending into partisan attacks.

There is nothing wrong with having differences. If they exist in mutual respect, they can even contribute to our unity.

But unity must triumph over self-interest.

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United a challenge we must meet

The most moving words of President Barack Obama's State of the Union Address ? and maybe the most important ones ? came near the end last Tuesday night when he talked about Cory Remsburg.